Contact
by YellowRosesAndHearts
Summary: After finale. Tommy's in montana, Jude's home, feeling like crap. They haven't talked. Reviews appreciated. Finally done.
1. Chapter 1

**_Okay, this is my first attempt at a multi chaptered story. (By multi chaptered, I mean six or seven at most. Possibly four or five.) I'll update if I get enough reviews saying I should, but as is, it could be a very short one shot. You guys decide._**

Disclaimer: imagine witty reason why so they're not mine.

Obviously, hitting number one helped out my depression for a little while. Okay, a bit longer than a little while. It got me through the winter, helped me smile big at celebrity events, even helped me flirt with guys with some semblance of ease.

Being friends with Jamie again also helped matters. Sure, Patsy was his number one now, and held that power over him that I once had. But still, after he told me that he was "Obsessive compulsive" when it came to me, it was a lot easier to go on being friends.

Even Sadie and I had finally gotten it right—we were sisters, real sisters now. I'd take her out to lunch every now and then, and after that, she'd make me over for what ever hang out I had that night. We giggled over her new relationship with Kwest, but I was really jealous of it. It wasn't that I wanted to be with Kwest or anything like that—I just wanted to be with someone who made me happy, like he made her. And I had a candidate in mind. Oh, god, I did.

Enter, Tommy Quincy. Or whatever his last name really was—he never got around to telling me. That haunts me at night when I lay awake thinking about him; I think of my birthday, and how adorable he sounded speaking in French, I think of the night after my record was finally finished that he kissed me. I can't forget that intoxicating feeling of his body crashing against mine no matter how much I try to. And, believe me, I try to.

So he left. And despite all the distractions that I have to stand in the way of the pain, eventually, obviously, it always comes back. I can't get Tommy out from under my skin. He was the first guy that I ever, really, truly considered myself in love with. The first person to awaken both my spiritual and sexual side in the same space without having to do anything.

I don't know where he went, why he went, or if he's ever coming back. He hasn't answered any of my letters or messages or phone calls. It really is like he just fell off the face of the earth. Except, if he had, I would at least know that he hadn't wanted to leave me. As it is now, I can't stop thinking about him, and I don't even feel like he still remembers my name. Maybe he doesn't.

Sometimes at night Sadie finds me crying on the Living Room couch with the late night TV still on. She begs me to tell her what's making me so upset, but I can't do it. I can't tell her that the reason I'm crying so much is because her ex kissed me and left. How does that sound? I'm trying to grow up here, trying to get stronger. And the first step of growing up is thinking before you speak. Seeing as I know exactly how that conversation would turn out, there's no point trying to have it.

So I'm here. And despite all the people that Jamie says are around and love me, I can't get over the fact that the guy I believed in left me without an explanation. And it sounds horribly cliché, but I can't remember ever feeling this alone.

_**Hit that nice little button and review, and I will love you always. **_


	2. Chapter 2

_**Okay, this is the first chapter of the actual story. The first one was an intro deal. Jude has been calling Tommy every day, and he hasn't been answering. This is the first day that she hasn't contacted him. As always, reviews are appreciated. I kind of know where I'm going with this, but if anyone has any ideas they want me to add, tell me. Please. Love you guys!**_

Disclaimer: I had them, and then I lent them to my friend who lost them, so they currently aren't mine.

I've drafted so many letters to Jude since I left. Dialed her cell number so many times, and listened to her sweet voice carrying the machine onto voicemail. I'm addicted to that voice. I've imagined the feel of her lips pressed up against mine more times than I can count. And I've imagined what that first date with her could have been like if I wasn't called away like that.

Right now, I'm writing yet another song in my down time—though, down time shouldn't exist when you've just discovered that you have a new daughter that you didn't know about for six years. And Sophie is a dream—a beautiful caramel skinned child that I've grown to love in the few months that I've known her. She shares my love of music, and sometimes, after dinner, she comes to sit in my lap and lets me sing to her. But even Sophie can't completely fill the void that was drilled in me when I left Jude and everything else about my old life behind.

A day hasn't passed since I left that Jude hasn't left me a message, or a text, or an email. But I haven't talked to her. Mostly because I don't know what to say. Jude's only seventeen, and I don't want to put my drama about my new kid on her. I'll be damned if I become another thing that forces her to grow up faster than she needs to. Still, though, not communicating with her eats away at me. Sometimes in her messages she cries, so heart wrenching that I can almost feel the tears in my own eyes. Sometimes, she pauses between words, and the line is filled with deep breaths that I wish I could feel again against my lips. Sometimes, she doesn't talk at all. She lets the beep for the message go, and doesn't say anything. On those days, she doesn't have to. Her silence is louder than anything she could possibly say.

Today, though, I look at the clock on the wall, reading nine o'clock, and I realize, half way through the middle of the song that I'm writing and singing, that Jude hasn't called me at all today. Some how, that doesn't sit well with me, and the immaturity of it all makes me really pissed off at myself_. Jude doesn't owe me anything. I'm the one that up and left her out of nowhere, and now I'm upset that she's letting go? What kind of person is like that? _My kind of person. Because I have been Jude's, completely and wholly Jude's, almost since the day we met. She's never known it, of course. I've lead her around so much since we met, dating her sister, kissing her and telling her to forget it, telling her she's too young for me. But no matter how much I pushed her away, I was still always hers. Jude's man, through and through.

The words are coming out of me now, faster and faster, and I'm afraid my pen won't be able to record them. The guitar comes naturally. The beat is slow, mellow, and mournful, like just about every thing I've written in the past three months.

_I'd l reach out to you_

_Pull you in, and love you_

_Let you be my everything_

_But I can't._

_Can't burden you that way_

_Can't do what's not good for you_

_But I can't forget it_

_What we could and couldn't have had_

_What we'll never have now_

_I think of all the wasted time_

_Kisses never shared_

_Adventures never pursued_

_You monopolize the mind._

_Every day I wake up, _

_Praying I'll see you, feel you next to me._

_But the sun rises ,and I'm still alone,_

_Wishing you were here._

The guitar drops to the ground, and I drop my head into my arms, feeling myself shaking. She didn't call me today. She's forgetting me, but I can't let her go, as much as I need to. I can't forget how much she balanced me out, how different, yet alike we are. It sounds so young minded, but I don't think there's anyone else out there for me but her. But I'm trying to do what's best for her. And what's best for her is focusing on her career, and not my problems.

I'm slipping, my resolve is crumbling, and it's definitely time to get a grip. I promised myself that I wouldn't contact her. Promised myself that I wouldn't bring her into this. But I don't know how much longer I can keep this up.

_**Hit that little button and review! All the cool kids are doing it!**_


	3. Chapter 3

**So this is a very short chapter—there will probably be one up later today. And yes, I'm aware that my chapters in general are short. I don't have much of an attention span.**

I decided today that there was nothing left to say.

He was gone. He went to take care of whatever business he had to take care of. It was time for me to get over it.

My new found strength didn't come easy, and I wasn't even sure if one could call it "strength". I sat in front of the fluorescent green phone in my room for hours earlier, picked it up, only to set it back down again. After the late afternoon became early evening, and I still had not called, I decided that maybe it was something telling me I shouldn't anymore. That maybe Tommy was much more dead- on than I had originally given him credit for.

All in all, it was not one of my easier decisions. I cried over it today, threw an almost two year old tantrum laying across my bed, pounding my fists, destroying my bedroom. When that was over, and I curled up into a ball, mellowing out, I had a moment of clarity. Or, as close to one as I've had in about three months. And the way I've been recently, I'll take lucidity of any kind.

I got up from my bed, dried my eyes, changed my clothes, and headed out for the night. I decided that the tears that had just left my eyes, would be the last ones I ever shed over Tommy Quincy.

And even though I could feel myself dying more inside, I thought maybe I was getting a little bit stronger.

**Again, there will probably be one more up today, and possibly more before Memorial day weekend it up.**


	4. Chapter 4

_**Yes, I am finally updating this story. Another chapter is written, and I'll be putting it up soon. And I know this story isn't moving at all, but in the next two chapters, things start happening. And thanks to everyone who has reviewed. Please keep them coming.**_

1It was finally morning.

I had felt like quite the preteen girl, sitting by the phone, and waiting for it to ring. Usually, the thought of not being more mature than a twelve year old would have sobered me from whatever offensive act I was commiting, but I was unable to care. When it came to Jude, normal rules didn't apply.

The clock on the wall told me that it was seven-thirty, soon, the rest of the house would wake up, and logic dictated that I should probably go to my room if I wanted anyone to believe that I had gotten any sleep. Somehow, though, logic was not quite so appealing.

The folder to my right had been holding my attention for the last few hours. The letters inside were half from Jude (forwarded by Kwest) and half to Jude from me, those letters obviously never sent. I told myself that when I could get the phrasing just right, I'd write her back. But the words always came out sounding either too casual or too longing.

Some of the letters weren't even full ones– most had one or two paragraphs before I had abandoned them, Some had barely a sentence. And still others read only "Dear Jude" at the top before I had decided that something about how I had written her name was not quite right. That I was somehow not doing it justice. All the abandoned letters stayed in the left flat of the folder, serving to remind me what a complete idiot I could be.

Then there were the letters she had written me; all different, and yet all equally perfect because she had written them. I had always marveled at how eloquently she could express herself to only be a teenager, it was a gift she had no matter how she was feeling. And me, well– Past a certain point, I didn't know what the hell to say anymore.

It took me a while to notice someone lingering in my shadow. I turned to see Sophie standing behind me, making no secret of the fact that she was trying to read the letter over my shoulder. _Thank god she's only six, and can't read yet._

"Who's Jude?" Spoke too soon. _Damn._

"Jude is..." Is? Was? She wasn't dead, but she wasn't in my life anymore, either. And yes, that was my fault. "...One of my friends."

Hallelujah for the goddamn understatement of the freaking year! Jude and I, just friends? That's a laugh. We were so much more, and still, at times, so much less than that.

"You don't talk to her anymore?"

How was it that a little girl knew exactly what buttons to push on me? Give that girl a metal. If she doesn't become some kind of ostracized prophet, she might have the misfortune of becoming a songwriter.

"Not as much as I'd like to." Or at all. That's more accurate.

Sophie started to open her mouth to ask another question, but I silenced her by speaking over her. Last thing I needed to do was spill my guts to a first- grader, which I would probably end up doing if this conversation didn't stop now.

"I've written something new, Soph. A song. Would you like to hear?"

I took her smile to mean yes, and within seconds the intriguing question of who Jude was ceased to exist in Sophie's mind. As I began to sing to her, I realized that I was only devoting half of myself to the music. The other half of me was concentrating on the still opened green folder in my lap.

_**Come on, review. You are itching to. You know you want to.**_


	5. Chapter 5

_**Tee hee, second update in a day. Yay. Now the story's moving a bit. And as always, I appreciate reviews, and can never get enough of them.**_

_**DISCLAIMER: Not mine. But that will soon change. I am at this point planning a large scale kidnapping. Anyone interested should hit me up.**_

1I'm on day two of my Tom Quincy rebellion, and am high on new found independence and no sleep. Sadie and I went out, and I splurged, splurged like I haven't done since My Sweet Time hit number one. Two days without sleep will numb you; after a while, almost all original thoughts are gone, you are left to fell, to observe, to touch– but never to contemplate. That's why I like not sleeping. It's the best excuse in the world for not anylizing all the crap going on in your life.

Sadie and I spent a million hours in the phone store, and I got a new cell, the first one since my not so sweet sixteen. It has the web, AIM, and a camera, plus other things listed in the manual that I am too buzzed to read right now.

Intellectually, I know that all these material things are exciting me way more than they should, but it's what Sadie calls "displacement theory". Let everything else push Lil Tommy Q right out of my little mind. Maybe that's how Sadie talked me into this club, because it sure as hell isn't my scene.

I have no idea what the hell I'm doing here, wearing this damn red dress that my sister picked out. Obviously. There's no way in hell I'd pick up a short dress by choice. A few guys have asked me to dance, and I've refused on the grounds that I can't dance. Or won't. Yes, won't. That's less damaging on the ego.

Across the bar, a guy is shooting me the eye. He's the seventh or eighth since Sadie left, and the only reason I'm giving him a second thought is because I know I've seen his eyes somewhere. They're cobalt blue, deep set, surrounded by long, dark lashes. He's looking through me; and I'm familiar with the feeling—a familiarity I don't like. _He's _here.

Upon closer inspection of the rest of the guys face, I can see clearly that he isn't—the hair is lighter, the nose is longer, and the lips aren't as full. But those eyes—they belonged to my former producer, even if the rest of his features didn't. I can't help but feeling like he's right across from me. A cheap, knock-off version, sure, but as close to the real thing as I am going to get. The guy gets up and begins walking toward me; I flip my newly red hair over one shoulder, switch my hips, and decide to meet him halfway.

"Ryan," he says.

"Jude," I reply.

When there is no yell of 'oh my god, you're Jude Harrison!' I figure I am in the clear, and stick out a hand for him to shake. He buys me a drink, a not dirty enough martini, which hits hard at first, and then adds to the recent buzz of nothingness in my head.

The conversation that follows is mediocre at best. The questions asked are throw away ones, but I'm not so much listening to what he's saying, but staring and wondering at those eyes and where I've seen them before.

When he asks me for a date, I hear myself saying yes before even considering the matter. As I leave the club, I wonder what possessed me to accept the offer—the fact that I haven't been on a real date in months, or that his eyes look just like Tommy's.


	6. Chapter 6

1I'm breaking.

That's right. I, Tom Quincy, ex lead singer of boysattack, hot shot producer, notorious ladies man– am breaking. Two and a half days without any sense of her, and I realize I have no idea what to do with myself. And this isn't good, by the way. I'm a twenty four year old man with a new daughter, and I am almost dependent on a naive, but still oh-so-profound girl who isn't even eighteen yet. There has to be a legal drug for getting someone out of your head. And if there isn't one, there should be. Maybe I should get on that.

Anyway, I'm digressing.

It's midnight, long after I've put Sophie to bed. And I'm sitting on the couch, waiting for the vodka to start working its magic. Damn my body for being able to hold alcohol. A guy needs to forget sometimes. And so help me god (or whoever the hell else is out there) I need to forget right now before I drive myself insane and do something we'll both regret in the long run. For that second, I find myself unable to hold myself back anymore. I hit the speed dial button– Jude is still number one. I don't have the heart to change it, and I don't know if I ever will. My finger is inching for the glowing number one, calling out to me seductively.

And then the phone vibrates. Goddamn call waiting.

The ID tells me that it's Sadie, and I'm so shocked that I pick it up. _Sadie? _She hasn't called in however long, and I don't blame her. Our breakup wasn't exactly pretty, and it sure as hell wasn't neat.

Sadie doesn't beat around the bush, but then, it never was her style. "You need to check on your girl."

She's pushing a boundary, you see. I don't talk to Sadie. I don't talk about Jude. And so I sure as hell am not going to talk to Sadie about Jude. And for a good freaking reason. We talk about her, I break. Simple as that. Simple as one and two making three.

"What—what do you mean?"

I can almost hear Sadie grimacing into the phone. When you've been friends with someone a long time, you can read into everything they don't say. Their pauses, their sentence structure, everything. Me and Sadie never got there, but it was different with Jude. Two weeks flat, and we damn near had our own language as if we'd known each other forever.

"She's not sleeping. She's like a freaking zombie. She's having trouble writing stuff. And she's going out and drinking more than she should. Girl's gonna hit bottom soon, Kwest and I are worried off our asses. And if you give a damn about her, you should be, too."

Somewhere deep down, I know she's right. I can hear the edge in her voice, but that's expected. What's unexpected is the almost pleading behind it. It's the pleading of a sister who really cares about her sibling, and has tried absolutely everything else. And my heart goes out to her. Sadie never had it easy since Jude won Instant Star, but now she's trying to do right by her. At my expense, sure. But the fact that she's calling me with this much pleading tells me Jude might not be the only one who has hit bottom.

"What do you want me to do, Sadie?" My voice comes out harsher than I intended. And I realize then that I am not asking her, but asking myself.

"Something! You always said you cared about her, that she got you. If all that crap is true, prove it! Make this better! I know the mess with her is about you!"

I don't answer, I _can't _answer.

When I hear Sadie's voice again, I can hear her tears. And for one horrifying moment, I want to cry with her.

"Do what you want," she says, before hanging up on me.

And hearing the dialtone to my ear, punching in Jude's cell so I can feel the numbers, I do just that. Furiously, my fingers press the five, the two, the four, the six, the seven, the eight, and the one. I lift the phone forcefully to my ear and wait for the answer.

It rings.

And it rings.

And it rings.

And it rings some more.

Until finally, I hear the mocking automated voice in the background, _"The number you have dialed is no longer in service."_


	7. Chapter 7

It's a toss up who looks more exhausted today, Sadie or me. I haven't slept in a few days, but I'm hitting that high that you get when adrenaline takes over in place of lack of sleep. Sadie, she looks like she hasn't slept for months, even though I found her collapsed on the couch this morning with the phone still propped up next to her ear. She still has on her jeans and tank top from the day before, and I wonder who she was calling who was _that _important. I think on that as I make the two of us breakfast, and finally decide that it was probably Kwest, like it usually is recently.

She ambles into the Kitchen, and mutters a "thank you", placing her hand briefly on my shoulder as she takes her plate, and cup of coffee that I have made just the way she likes it. It's a small gesture, but I realize that I now can't deny how much like real sisters we have become.

"Late night, Jude?"

I laugh to myself. She knows that I have not been sleeping, but has had the grace not to mention it to Mom, who has been recently keeping a very sharp eye on me.

"You could say that."

She looks up at me, eyes bagged. She looks more like a wreck than I do, and she's been getting her rest. "You need your sleep, Jude."

I shrug slightly at her, and try, in vain, to convince her that I am fine. She doesn't buy it.

"Jude. This is getting ridiculous. Go to bed now. I'll clean the Kitchen."

For once, I am grateful for that stupid lunch date I have set with Ryan for later. "Can't. I've got a date in two hours."

Her eyes light up with excitement, as if she is the one who has the date. "That's great. Is he cute?"

I don't feel the butterflies that I am supposed to feel in my stomach thinking about a new guy. And I know that I'm being unfair. There's nothing wrong with Ryan. His only crime is not being—well, not being Tommy. "He's okay."

Sadie nods, all traces of excitement gone. Damn that girl for being able to read into what I really mean. I thought that stopped when Tommy left. "Well, you go get ready. I can do your hair, if you like."

"It's fine. Thanks."

I hear the pounding of my shoes up the stairs as if they aren't mine at all. I'm not awake, but then, I haven't been awake for three months. I haven't been me for three months. And all I want to do is to start living again.

It doesn't take all that much preparation for me to get ready, not like you'd expect from a nearly 18 year old teenager getting ready for a date. I settle on the second outfit that I try on—a pair of ripped jeans, and v-neck silky green tank top that ties just below the chest. Make-up? Unneeded. Hair? I don't feel like it, and so I just comb it out and leave it. Shoes? Black flip flops. No need to be uncomfortable for a date you don't really want to go on anyway. Well, take that back. I'd love to go on a date—just not with him.

I don't feel like going back downstairs, and so I just turn on the TV, and watch old episodes of Full House. I hate this show, but since I was twelve, it has become a tradition when I am upset to retreat to a confined space with Full House and Ben and Jerry's. Somehow, it's comfortable.

Half an hour passes, then forty- five minutes. Then one hour, then One hour and twenty. At one hour and forty five, I concede to myself that it is probably time to leave and turn off the TV. There is a knocking at the front door, and I figure, with a sigh, that it's probably Ryan. I wait for Sadie to call me down, and when she doesn't, I begin to amble down the front stairs.

I smell his cologne first. How long has it been that I've dreamed of lying against his chest and breathing in that scent again? And then I see the leather jacket, and the white Tee shirt underneath. And then the eyes. Tommy. And not the knock off version, but the real thing this time.

He's here.

What the hell?

Oh, my, God.

I don't know what to say, do, or think, when he flashes that knowing smile at me, and whispers "Hey girl" in that husky voice that has been haunting me for three months, but even more so in the past three days.

All I know is that I can't take it. He's screwing with my strength here. And in my sleep deprived, slightly hung over mind, there's nothing to do but make a break for my bedroom.


	8. Chapter 8

_**Back by popular demand! Two updates in the same day, aren't I on a roll? I'm really glad people seem to be enjoying this story. So glad, in fact, that I decided to move my lazy ass off the couch and onto the computer to finish this soon. This is the second to last Chapter, and as always, I love reviews.**_

I called that number at least ten more times.

It felt as if maybe, if I was insistent enough, somehow, she'd answer. And so I tried. And tried. And tried some more.

Logic intervened eventually, and though I knew that Jude was still out there, though I knew that I could still talk to her another way, I couldn't help feeling like this was the end. This was the ultimate in her giving up on me—she had changed her phone number so that I wouldn't be able to reach her even if I did call. And I knew, knew, that this was intentional. Jude wasn't the type of person who did things without reasons.

And after that I regressed to my days as a pre teenager, locking myself in my room with a note on my door that said, "Sleeping. Please do not disturb." Immature, yes. Unhelpful, yes. But I was not, and, currently, am not—any good to anyone they way I feel right now.

Around two I got into my car, and just began to drive around. First, not really going anywhere. I pulled up in front of a bar, but found that I didn't really have much of an appetite for drinks. And so I drove on, until the Montana liscense plates faded into nothingness. Until the country became city, then country again. By morning, the liscense plates began to read Toronto, and I began to notice my old hangouts. First, the hotel I had given my first show in, then G major. Then my childhood home, then my favorite club. I didn't know why I was here, and in fact, could barely register that I was back home. All I knew was that I had broken down, that I was unable to take the unfamiliarity anymore.

I wound up at her house purely by accident.

And then I was immobilized. _She _was here. Not fifty feet away, and I could see her, red headed again, in the kitchen, bustling around the stove, presumably preparing breakfast. And I suddenly could understand what Sadie meant.

Jude was always going to be beautiful, nothing was ever going to change that. But she had gotten thinner. The weight she'd lost seemed to make her blue eyes stand out more, but also made her look stressed. But then, considering what I had put her through, stressed was probably an understatement.

Sadie entered the room later, looking both Physically and emotionally tired. And it didn't sit well with me to know that I was the cause of both of their mess ups.

Eventually Jude left, and Sadie began to clean the Kitchen, occasionally stopping to put her hand over her head, and, once, stopping to wipe away tears that had accumulated on her face. Almost two hours passed, and I watched, knowing that my own household had already woken up, and knowing that soon Sophie would be asking the Nanny where her daddy was. And though I had absolutely no intention of leaving her, this was something that I had to do for me.

A hand knocked on the door, and when it opened, I realized that it had been mine. I was meant face to face with a stunned Sadie, who neither opened the door like I had hoped she would, nor closed it in my face like I had been afraid of. Instead, she stared, until I pushed past her.

"I had to see her after… after last night."

I figured there was no point beating around the bush. Sadie would appreciate my being direct.

Though, at present, she seemed too surprised to appreciate much of anything. "So you… So you… God, Tom. You sure know how to pick a bad time."

A bad time? I had ridden down here for I didn't know how many hours. Convenience could kiss my ass at this point.

"She's—she's got a date in a few minutes."

That brought me back to myself.

But before I had time to regroup, She was walking down the stairs. The first thing I saw was the green silk, and I was absurdly reminded of the dress she had worn on her sixteenth birthday. And thinking of her sixteenth birthday reminded me of a certain kiss, and remembering that kiss took my mind all kinds of places it didn't need to go. She was thinner, but she still seemed to glow—in that way that only Jude could. And that look on her face of stunned shock, she looked as if she wanted to pinch me to make sure that I was real. But then, I supposed, it made sense. She had had no sense of me for three months, and suddenly, here I was.

Oh God. Had I really done that to her? Left her to her own imagination about where I was and what I was doing? Left her to wonder if I was even alright? I hadn't had any contact with her for three days and it drove me insane. Had I really done the same thing to her for months? What kind of person did that?

If I was in her place, I would not be able to forgive me. Hell, I wasn't in her place, and I still doubted whether I would be able to forgive me.

The next thing I knew, she was running up the stairs. And all I knew was that I'd do anything, _anything, _to make it right.

_**Just one more chapter. One more. One more. **_


	9. Chapter 9

_**So this is the last chapter, you guys. It has been quite a ride for my longest fic to date, and I want to thank everybody who reviewed. You honestly kept me going with this.**_

_**DISCLAIMER: Still not mine.**_

How the hell did I get here?

My bedroom has become one of my only constants in the past few months. A place I go for seclusion, because it's nessecary, not even because I want it. It's comforting, yes—holding the bed I've had since I was eleven, and the posters of Rock Stars on the walls. The closet holds my newly replenished wardrobe of clothes that I wear when Darius yells at me to be more high fashion, but the dresser houses the clothes I actually wear. Jamie and I painted this dresser together when I was a few years younger, and even though now it does not match anything, I don't have the heart to get rid of it. Yes, my room is pretty damn awesome if I do say so myself. There is only one bad thing to be said about it.

My bedroom is the only one in the house without a lock.

And that becomes painfully obvious when a certain talented, dark-haired, blue eyed producer pokes his head in through my door. Tommyis just as gorgeous as I remember, even more devilishly handsome, if that is even possible. That unsure smile that he's shooting me, asking my permission to come in, can still melt me, and that doesn't sit right. At all.

I shake my head sharply, saying nonverbally, _No, Tommy. No, you can't._

He rolls his eyes and tilts his head to the side, as if to reply, _Girl, do you really think I drove all this way just to hear a no and leave?_

I hate to admit that he has a point. Short of forcibly throwing him out of my bedroom, I know Tommy well enough to know that he won't leave. I release a curt breath, and jerk my head into the direction he's facing.

He comes in slowly, with his hands raised as if in submission, in an "I come in peace" sort of gesture. He doesn't relax, and instead, stands in front of my red beanbag chairand points vaguely at it. I nod, and he sits down.

Oh great, we're still having nonverbal conversations. It's comforting to think that we are still that much in sync with one another, but maddening to wonder if it will never stop. It kills me to think that I may have met the one guy who really gets me, but to know that he will always end up hurting me.

I raise my eyebrows at him. _So. Talk._

"I'm so sorry, girl," he begins, and then, everything begins pouring out. I'm sure that I am a great audience, gasping, smiling, and nodding at the most opportune times. I'm not really listening, and am nowhere close to forgiving him. But then he tells me. He has a daughter.

"You what?"

He begins to explain—to talk about how he fathered a child out on the road when he was still married to Portia, how he was never really sure if it was his, how the child's mother had moved away to some godforsaken town in Montana, How she had proved that the girl was his just before her death. He talks and talks, until I finally manage to let out the one question that has been plaguing me for months.

"Why couldn't you just tell me?"

"I—it was a different world then for me, Jude. I didn't want to put my mess on you, I didn't want you worrying about me."

"And?" I know he's not finished, and I figure that he just needs a little prompting.

"And I didn't want something I did when I was seventeen to change the way you felt about me."

"It wouldn't have—didn't. God, Tom, did you honestly think I would judge you? Since when have I ever done that?"

He sighs, looks around, trying to pull a rationale out of the air. "I don't even know. I just, I didn't know how to handle it. But I can't believe I did that to you. I feel so horrible about it."

I laugh, for the first time in the entire exchange. "Well, you should."

He turns around, sees me laughing, and joins in, eyes closed. After I stop he's still going, and it gives me time to completely appraise him—he dresses the same, but he's different on the cosmetic front. I'm not sure if it's because he's been out all night, but his hair is considerably less gelled than normal, and he's got a bit of five o'clock shadow around his lips and cheeks. I decide that I like it. And his secret, as much as it should, has not changed one bit how I feel about him.

"I can feel you looking at me, girl."

I shrug, and go for honesty. "I haven't been able to for a few months. It's expected."

He's suddenly serious again. "I really am sorry, girl. But when you—when you stopped calling, I almost went crazy. I didn't know what to think, I didn't know if you were even alright."

"Welcome to the club," I respond. It's unintended, but there is an angry edge to my voice, and his head sinks down a bit.

"I know," he whispers to his knees.

And though I know I shouldn't, though I know that I am letting him off way too easy, I find myself lifting his chin with my hand.

"I want you to forgive me," he says, into my eyes.

I take a second to gather a breath, and nod at him. "I'm working on it."

He smiles at me, in that intimate way that only Tommy can. I watch his lips leaning toward me, and find myself wanting, far more than I should. But the kiss never lands.

"I've got to go," he says. When my face falls, he elaborates. "For today. But I'm going to visit, you can bet your ass on that. How's every weekend sound?"

_Like not nearly enough. _But he's trying, and I've got to respect that. "It sounds nice. Really. I'll hold you to it."

"I wouldn't have it any other way. You have fun on your date, girl."

My insides feel like screaming. My date? Who gives a damn about my date? What the hell, has Tommy actually gotten over me? The thought is almost too much to bear, but then I see his face, looking as pained as I feel.

He reaches out, and kisses me hard on the top of my head, before leaving. And I feel hopeful. Yes, I'm about to go out on a date with a guy I don't really like. But I have Tommy back now, and for the first time in forever, we have acknowledged how much we really mean to each other.

And the rest, well—the rest will come later.

_**And that's all. Please don't hate me for the ending, that seemed to be where it was going. I'm thinking of writing a sequel if you guys would like. Any ideas for it, and I would be happy to hear them.**_


End file.
